Astronomy News

Webb Sees Clouds in Hazy Atmosphere of Titan

These images of Saturn’s moon Titan were captured by Webb’s NIRCam instrument on November 4, 2022. Left: image using F212N, a 2.12-micron filter sensitive to Titan’s lower atmosphere; the bright spots are prominent clouds in the northern hemisphere. Right: color composite image using a combination of NIRCam filters; several prominent surface features are labeled: Kraken Mare is thought to be a methane sea; Belet is composed of dark-colored sand dunes; Adiri is a bright albedo feature. Image credit: NASA / ESA / CSA / A. Pagan, STScI / Webb Titan GTO Team.
Dec 2, 2022 by News Staff

Titan, the largest moon of Saturn, is the only moon in the Solar System with a dense atmosphere, and it is also the only planetary body other than Earth that currently has rivers, lakes, and seas. These images of Saturn’s moon Titan were captured by Webb’s NIRCam instrument on November 4, 2022. Left: image using F212N, a 2.12-micron filter sensitive to Titan’s lower atmosphere; the bright spots are prominent clouds in the northern hemisphere....

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An artist’s impression of a tidal disruption event. Image credit: Carl Knox / OzGrav, ARC Centre of Excellence for Gravitational Wave Discovery, Swinburne University of Technology.

Astronomers Detect Very Luminous Jet from Star-Eating Supermassive Black Hole

Dec 1, 2022 by News Staff

A supermassive black hole devours a star that has come too close. In extremely rare instances — only about 1% of the time — these so-called...

This Webb image shows the merging galaxy pair ZW II 96. Image credit: NASA / ESA / CSA / Webb / L. Armus / A. Evans / Hubble Heritage Team / STScI / AURA / Hubble Collaboration.

Webb Watches Cataclysmic Collision of Two Galaxies

Dec 1, 2022 by Enrico de Lazaro

The Webb team has released a beautiful photo taken by the NASA/ESA/CSA James Webb Space Telescope of ZW II 96, a merging galaxy pair in the constellation...

This Webb image shows the center of Messier 74. Image credit: NASA / ESA / CSA / Webb / Hoyer et al., arXiv: 2211.13997.

Webb Focuses on Nuclear Star Cluster of Messier 74

Nov 30, 2022 by Natali Anderson

Using new images from the NASA/ESA/CSA James Webb Space Telescope as well as archival data from the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope, astronomers have studied...

This Hubble image shows NGC 2660, an open cluster 8,617 light-years away in the constellation of Vela. Image credit: NASA / ESA / T. von Hippel, Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University / Gladys Kober, NASA & Catholic University of America.

Hubble Space Telescope Takes a Close Look at NGC 2660

Nov 30, 2022 by Enrico de Lazaro

Astronomers using the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope have taken a very detailed image of the open cluster NGC 2660. This Hubble image shows NGC 2660,...

This Hubble image shows the 12-billion-year-old globular cluster Pismis 26. Imag credit: NASA / ESA / R. Cohen, Rutgers the State University of New Jersey / Gladys Kober, NASA / Catholic University of America.

Hubble Observes Globular Cluster Pismis 26

Nov 29, 2022 by Enrico de Lazaro

The Hubble team has released a beautiful image of Pismis 26, an ancient globular cluster in the constellation of Scorpius. This Hubble image shows the...

This Hubble image shows DEM L 190, a young supernova remnant in the Large Magellanic Cloud. Image credit: NASA / ESA / Hubble / S. Kulkarni / Y. Chu.

Hubble Spots Colorful Supernova Remnant in Large Magellanic Cloud

Nov 28, 2022 by Enrico de Lazaro

The new Hubble image shows sheets and filaments of debris from a massive star that exploded as a supernova in the Large Magellanic Cloud, a nearby, small...

This illustration shows the IXPE spacecraft (right) observing the blazar Markarian 501 (left). A blazar is a black hole surrounded by a disk of gas and dust with a bright jet of high-energy particles pointed toward Earth. The inset illustration shows high-energy particles in the jet (blue). When the particles hit the shock wave, depicted as a white bar, the particles become energized and emit X-rays as they accelerate. Moving away from the shock, they emit lower-energy light: first visible, then infrared, and radio waves. Farther from the shock, the magnetic field lines are more chaotic, causing more turbulence in the particle stream. Image credit: NASA / Pablo Garcia.

IXPE Spacecraft Examines Particle Acceleration in Blazar Jets

Nov 24, 2022 by News Staff

Blazars are active galactic nuclei with jets of magnetized plasma that point nearly along the line of sight. Most of the light from these extremely luminous...

This image of the Orion Nebula features plenty of dust but no stars. The color image is a composite of separate exposures acquired by NASA’s Spitzer Space Telescope, NASA’s Wide-Field Infrared Survey Explorer and ESA’s Herschel Space Telescope. Image credit: NASA / ESA / JPL-Caltech.

Astronomers Release Breathtaking New View of Orion Nebula

Nov 24, 2022 by Enrico de Lazaro

The famous Orion Nebula can be seen with the naked eye as a fuzzy patch surrounding the star Theta Orionis in the Hunter’s Sword, below Orion’s belt. This...

This illustration shows what WASP-39b could look like, based on the current understanding of the planet. Image credit: NASA / ESA / CSA / Webb / J. Olmsted, STScI.

Webb Reveals Atmospheric Composition of Hot-Saturn WASP-39b

Nov 22, 2022 by News Staff

While the NASA/ESA/CSA James Webb Space Telescope and other space telescopes previously have revealed isolated ingredients of the atmosphere of WASP-39b,...

This artist’s illustration emphasizes the shape of the stellar halo surrounding our Milky Way Galaxy. Image credit: Melissa Weiss / Harvard & Smithsonian’s Center for Astrophysics.

Milky Way’s Stellar Halo is Oblong and Tilted, Astronomers Say

Nov 21, 2022 by News Staff

Accounting for approximately 1% of the total stellar mass, the stellar halo — the diffuse cloud of stars surrounding the Galactic disk — plays...

Two galaxies in the Arp-Madore 417-391 system (right) form a ring shape, which is narrow and blue, and the cores of the two galaxies form a bulge on the ring’s side. Two smaller spiral galaxies appear left of center as well as a few stars. Image credit: NASA / ESA / Hubble / Dark Energy Survey / DOE / FNAL / DECam / CTIO / NOIRLab / NSF / AURA / J. Dalcanton.

Hubble Space Telescope Observes Peculiar Galaxy Merger

Nov 21, 2022 by Enrico de Lazaro

This system of two massive galaxies — located in the southern constellation of Eridanus — is called Arp-Madore 417-391. Two galaxies in the...

Kishimoto et al. captured a long-sought-after view of the dusty inner region in NGC 4151. Image credit: Georgia State University / CHARA Array.

Astronomers Detect Innermost Dusty Ring of Active Galactic Nucleus

Nov 19, 2022 by News Staff

Astronomers using the Center for High Angular Resolution Astronomy (CHARA) Array interferometer at the Mount Wilson Observatory have observed the long-sought,...

GLASS-z12 is captured in this Webb image of the outer regions of the galaxy cluster Abell 2744. Image credit: NASA / ESA / CSA / T. Treu, UCLA.

Webb Discovers Two Remarkably Luminous Galaxies in Early Universe

Nov 17, 2022 by News Staff

The two newfound galaxies, dubbed GLASS-z12 and GLASS-z10, existed approximately 350 and 450 million years after the Big Bang. GLASS-z12 (redshift of 12.5)...

The protostar IRAS 04368+2557, shown in this Webb image, is embedded within LDN 1527, a cloud of material that is feeding its growth. Image credit: NASA / ESA / CSA / STScI / J. DePasquale, STScI.

Webb Sees Hourglass-Like Nebula around Young Protostar

Nov 16, 2022 by Enrico de Lazaro

Astronomers using the Near Infrared Camera (NIRCam) onboard the NASA/ESA/CSA James Webb Space Telescope have revealed new details surrounding the dark...

Ecker et al. suggest that light (heavy) stars have stiff (soft) cores and soft (stiff) outer layers. Image credit: Peter Kiefer / Luciano Rezzolla.

Theoretical Study Sheds More Light on Internal Properties of Neutron Stars

Nov 15, 2022 by News Staff

Using more than 10 million randomly generated equations of state that satisfy nuclear theory and astronomical observations, astrophysicists from the Institut...

Bonsor et al. present distinct observational evidence from white dwarf planetary systems for planetesimal formation occurring during the first few hundred thousand years after cloud collapse in exoplanetary systems. Image credit: NASA / JPL-Caltech.

Stars and Building Blocks of Their Planets ‘Grow Up’ Together, New Study Suggests

Nov 15, 2022 by News Staff

The timing and locations of formation of planetesimals — the building blocks of planets — are crucial to the understanding of planet formation....

This Hubble image shows the dense core CB 130-3. Image credit: NASA / ESA / Hubble / STScI / C. Britt / T. Huard / A. Pagan.

Hubble Spots Carbon-Chain-Rich Molecular Cloud

Nov 14, 2022 by Enrico de Lazaro

The Hubble team has released a detailed photo taken by the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope of the orange molecular cloud CB 130-3. This Hubble image shows...

This new view of the Cone Nebula was captured with the FORS2 instrument on ESO’s Very Large Telescope. Image credit: ESO.

ESO Celebrates Its 60th Anniversary with Stunning View of Cone Nebula

Nov 10, 2022 by Enrico de Lazaro

On October 5, 1962, five countries agreed to create the European Southern Observatory (ESO) through the signature of a convention. Now, six decades later...

This image, taken by the Near-Infrared Camera aboard the NASA/ESA/CSA James Webb Space Telescope, displays countless stars in the dwarf irregular galaxy Wolf-Lundmark-Melotte as well as dozens of background galaxies. The image includes 0.9-micron light shown in blue, 1.5-micron in cyan, 2.5-micron in yellow, and 4.3-micron in red. Image credit: NASA / ESA / CSA / STScI / K. McQuinn, Rutgers University / A. Pagan, STScI.

Webb Focuses on Isolated Dwarf Galaxy

Nov 10, 2022 by Enrico de Lazaro

The new image of the dwarf irregular galaxy Wolf-Lundmark-Melotte demonstrates the remarkable ability of the NASA/ESA/CSA James Webb Space Telescope to...

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